Introduction

Sometimes in our life we need to make many decisions, just a small example, even we must decide at what time we eat, or at what time we sleep. Of course there are always consequences in every decision we make. But the problem is, not every decision we make is the easy one, something we need to make tough decision, or sometimes we need to make a decision but that decision will bring us to another decision, and so on. So sometimes it’s really not easy to make a decision.
That’s why to help us, we can put all our situations and also the consequences from that situation in a table. People name it as Decision Table. Decision Table is a precise yet compact way to model complicated logic. Decision tables, like if-then-else and switch-case statements, associate conditions with actions to perform[1[[#_ftn1|[1]]] The other benefit from this decision table is we can be more sure that the decision we make is the right one, so far we input the right criteria and rules.
In this article I try to implement a decision table for a Package service from Germany to Indonesia. In this case I will also compare services from 2 shipping companies DHL and UPS™

Package Service Germany – Indonesia by DHL

DHL offers 2 main options for sending a package to Indonesia,
Normal Sending
Express Sending
The main different between these two options is in the services, with Express Sending it’s very quick, compared with Normal Sending.

Normal Sending

In Normal Sending you have 2 main options
Small Package (maximal 2Kg)
Normal Package (maximal 20Kg)

Small Package (>30 days) (10-15 days with Premium services)
Small Package is really a cheaper service, and this is the answer to anyone wants to send a small package and not in a rush. Besides maximal 2Kg, there is also a rule regarding the dimension of the package. There are also some possibilities of additional services which are:
Premium (With this service the delivery time the of the package will be quicker around 40%-50% and also an insurance maximal 500 Euro)
Gogreen (Donation small money to help our environment)
Sender’s instructions (Service for what you want to do in case your package is undeliverable)
Pick-Up (Service for arranging a pick up of your package)
Rollform (Service in case you don’t send your package in a box format but in roll format)
And here is the price list for small package:

And here is the price list for additional services:
Gogreen
0,50 Euro
Roll Form
1,50 Euro
Sender’s Instruction
20 Euro when you want the package to be sent back to you
Premium
12,90 Euro

Normal Package (10-12 Days) (6-8 Days with Premium services)
Normal Package is a standard service to send a package, there are some possible options regarding the weight of the package, such as 5Kg 10Kg and 20Kg. And basically all services are offered in Small Package and also in Normal Package and plus some additional extra services which are:
Bulky Goods (Service in case your package dimension is bigger than normal package)
Insurance (Service to insure your package, in case your package is damaged or lost)
Here is the price list for this Normal Package:

And here is the price list for additional services:
Premium

Weight	Outlet Price	Online Price
5 Kg	21	21
10 Kg	42	42
20 Kg	84	84

Gogreen
0,50 Euro
Roll Form
1,50 Euro
Bulky Goods
20 Euro
Sender’s Instruction
20 Euro when you want the package to be sent back to you
Insurance
Max 500 Euro = 6 Euro, and + 1,50 Euro for every additional 100 Euro

Express Sending (3 Days)

Express Sending is the solution for someone who needs a quicker way to send their package. And as generally this package is already covered with 500 Euro insurance. But in case the value of your package is more than that, there is also the possibility to use extra insurance services which is 3,50 Euro for package value until 2.500 euro and 15 Euro for package value until 25.000 Euro.
Here is the price list for this Express Sending:

UPS™

As a comparison I also add sending service with another company, in this case I choose UPS™. UPS™ has 2 main options for sending a package which are:
Normal sending (3 days) and Express sending (5 days)
The main different between these two services is pure in delivery time of the package. And same as DHL, they also have some additional services. A little different between UPS™ and DHL is, UPS™ uses dimensional weight and also normal weight measurement. So in case you send a package with 3 Kg weight but your box’s dimension is higher than 3Kg in dimensional weight, you need to pay more for that. To measure dimensional weight is just (length x height x wide) / 6000, and the result from this calculation we get dimensional weight.
Here is the price list for an example 12Kg & 4,5Kg shipping with UPS™

And here is the price list for additional services in UPS™:

Conclusion between DHL and UPS™

Based on price list and also delivery time, I think DHL has a cheaper price compared with UPS™. It’s true that UPS™ has more additional services such as the guarantee that our package will arrive on time, or we can also be notified when our package has already arrived in the destination. But with this kind of additional services we need to pay more than 100 Euro, so I think unless it’s really necessary I think DHL is really a good option.

Creating Decision Table for DHL Package with Prologa

Tables

To make it easier, I create 4 Tables
DHL Package Service (This is the main Table)
DHL Small Package (For people who need to send a package below than 2Kg)
DHL Normal Package (For people who need to send a package up to 20Kg)
DHL Express Package (For people who need to send a Express Package)
Inside every table I put all possible conditions regarding the topic. An example
I put a question to describe which service people want to use, Normal or Express. Or I also put question regarding weight of the package, because there is a relationship between weight and price.
Actions and Rules
Talking about actions and rules I think there are 2 possibilities regarding how we develop the actions and rules. As an example:
In Table DHL Small Package and DHL Normal Package, I create a very specific action and also a very specific rule, so we only get the 1 result at the end. To make that more clear, here is a picture describing what I mean with very specific action and rule:

As we can see in the picture, to get Action number 39 we need to have 7 match criteria.
And different with what I use in Table Express Package, in this Table I try to create possibilities to get 2 actions at the end. And once again to make it more clearly here, I insert a picture to describe that.

As we can see in the picture, the result of this Table is possible not only 1, because I create a rule to make that possible. So the result of this Table is 1 of Action 1-6 and possible action 7. But you don’t always get the action 7 because that depends on the answer of condition 2.
Next question why we need such kind of condition and rule. Because when I try to create a rule for a Normal Package, as example I need to create so many Actions and Conditions because there are many possibilities of Action from Conditions in this Table. So at the end that can make us create a wrong action or rule. As also you can see in my Express Package, there are only 7 Actions and 7 Rules in there, but when I make a specific rule and action, at least I need 12 actions and 12 rules.

Consultation

Consultation is a part to test our Rules and Actions whether those rules and actions are already correct or not. Here I attach a picture during we try our rules and actions:

As we can see in the picture, during consultation Prologa will execute our rules and will give as the result (action) based on what we have created before.
And here is the link to download my prologa files.